From friend D:

Fiscal policy, Katrina, and why "stupid" fits

In my opinion – and that of most economists – our federal government just hasn’t a clue about sensible fiscal policy. Here are excerpts from two articles which particularly meld with my thinking. Your mileage may vary.

Fiscal Policy: Why ‘Stupid’ Fits

Hurricane Rita heads inexorably westward, threatening to add to the human and financial costs of Hurricane Katrina. And when it comes to taxes and spending, Washington acts as if nothing is happening.
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Here’s a fact getting far too little attention: The cost this year alone of the Bush tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003 comes to $225 billion. In other words, the revenue lost because of tax cuts going through this year without any congressional action would more than pay the costs of Katrina recovery.
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I’d have much more respect for [Bush tax-cut supporters] if they just came out and said: “Look, we love deficit spending. That's why we waged wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and cut taxes at the same time. It’s why we'll talk about offsets for Katrina and Rita but never enact them, except maybe a few cuts in programs for the poor. All we really care about are passing tax cuts – and popular spending programs that get us reelected so we can enact more tax cuts.”

Not very politic, I'll grant you, but honest. Vice President Cheney came as close as anyone to this form of honesty when he spoke in support of the tax cuts on dividends shortly after the 2002 elections. His words, alas, came at a closed meeting. According to Ron Suskind’s book “The Price of Loyalty,” Cheney referred to the former president in insisting to his administration colleagues that… Republicans owed themselves more tax cuts. “We won the midterms,” Cheney said. “This is our due.” All hail the former Halliburton CEO for being candid enough to put the accent on power and privilege, not on policy and those oh?so?boring fiscal concerns. I guess balanced budgets aren't for “big?picture guys.”

Which brings us back to that word “stupid”… The crowd running our government is dazed and stupefied by a theory that sees throwing ever-larger sums to the wealthy in the form of tax cuts as so good, right and important that all the ordinary rules of finance and economics can be thrown out the window. If it was already stupid to pursue more tax cuts once the country decided to wage a large war on terrorism, it is supremely stupid to stay on the same course now that Katrina has added to our fiscal burdens and Rita, God help us, threatens to add more.

...And what's more:

Editorial

Mr. Bush isn't just dusting off a failed policy tool. He’s proposing a particularly bad version of it. Unlike many enterprise zones, the [Gulf Opportunity] Zone offers tax breaks for investment but not for job creation. And unlike nearly all others, it lavishes subsidies not only on desirable businesses but also on dubious ones that clearly don't need tax incentives.

This last error is illustrated by Mr. Bush’s willingness to subsidize casinos. …[S]ome casino companies have already declared that they plan to rebuild “bigger and better” on the Gulf Coast, but the Go?Go Zone would extend tax breaks to them anyway. This charity amazes even the casino people. A spokesman for Harrah’s Entertainment Inc. confessed to The Post: “We’re actually scratching our heads. We can't ever remember an instance of being offered a tax credit – ever.”

There is a reason for this. Casinos create some tourism and employment, but they empty the pockets of many who can ill afford it; their contribution to social progress is doubtful. Casinos have therefore been expected to justify their existence by generating lots of tax revenue. Now Mr. Bush wants to give them tax breaks. Go figure.

- rob 7:08 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Make BP clean it up!

Montana faces eternal clean-up of toxic lake

Even as bad as the sewage and chemical infested water around New Orleans may be, the Berkeley Pit, a toxic lake filling a 1-1/2 by 1 mile open pit mine in Butte (pop. 34,000) may pose an even greater long-term ecological risk.

The site, which includes land near the lake, is the largest

Superfund environmental clean-up project in the country in terms of area.
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Unlike the sudden devastation of the Gulf Coast floods, the Berkeley Pit mess was many decades in the making, a legacy of the demand for copper wire spurred by electrification that made Butte America's mother lode of copper, generating an estimated $48 billion in mineral wealth.

The "Copper Kings" of the Butte mines made vast riches starting in the 1870s. By 1955, Anaconda Mining Company decided it was most economical to engage in open-pit mining rather than to continue digging a maze of underground shafts.

The Atlantic Richfield Company, which is now owned by BP, bought Anaconda in 1977, and ended active mining in the Berkeley Pit in 1982.

Look they bought a company and did "due deligence" and one of the assets was this Pit. Clean it up BP - all of it - now - quickly - and don't use a dime of my (tax) money.

- rob 5:59 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Oh Please just arrest the lot of them already

Report: Tyco exec says lobbyist bragged Rove could help it

NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff bragged two years ago that he was in contact with White House political aide Karl Rove to fight a move to crackdown on firms which used offshore headquarters to pay lower U.S. taxes, according to a published report.

George Bush is the President of Corporate interests... he is not the President of America.

- rob 5:55 PM - [PermaLink] -

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George if you won't listen the the citizens of America (you know - your boss), maybe you'll listen to your "friends for life' pals.

Saudi Warns U.S. Iraq May Face Disintegration

WASHINGTON, Sept. 22 - Prince Saud al-Faisal, the Saudi foreign minister, said Thursday that he had been warning the Bush administration in recent days that Iraq was hurtling toward disintegration, a development that he said could drag the region into war.

"There is no dynamic now pulling the nation together," he said in a meeting with reporters at the Saudi Embassy here. "All the dynamics are pulling the country apart." He said he was so concerned that he was carrying this message "to everyone who will listen" in the Bush administration.

Everyone who will listen - pretty small number I bet.

- rob 5:54 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Talking Points Memo: I knew the House Republicans couldn't be trusted managing the federal budget

But if you go to page 17 of the 'Operation Offset' budget plan they're circulating, you'll see they propose to "eliminate attache positions in the Foreign Agricultural Service." And by this they claim they'll get more than $37 billion of savings just next year. $347 billion over ten years.
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If you look down into the explanation section, it notes that the savings are in millions, not billions, on this and the item below on cuts at the Department of Education. Yet, they push this transcription error through the whole document. So about half a trillion dollars worth of savings they claim doesn't even exist.

- rob 5:52 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Earlier this week it was Monday: The Top Ten Conservative Idiots, No. 212 - Democratic Underground

4. Michael Chertoff
Former FEMA director Michael Brown was sent packing a week ago because, well, someone had to get sacked after the shameful federal response to Hurricane Katrina. And let's face it, he was totally incompetent. But since then we learned that we might have actually fired the wrong guy. According to federal documents reviewed by Knight Ridder Newspapers, "The federal official with the power to mobilize a massive federal response to Hurricane Katrina was Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, not the former FEMA chief."

The explanation is a little complicated, but basically it comes down to this: Michael Brown didn't have any authority to order a massive federal response until Michael Chertoff gave him that authority. And Chertoff didn't give him the authority until the afternoon of August 30 — about 36 hours after the Hurricane hit. Before that moment, Chertoff was in charge. And during that time when Chertoff was in charge, Chertoff didn't do anything. Except, perhaps, sit in his office and chertoff, if you know what I mean.

The White House and the Department of Homeland Security did not have any explanation for why Chertoff waited 36 hours before handing off authority. But in hindsight it looks pretty obvious, to me at least, what happened. You see, after about 36 hours Chertoff and everyone else in the Administration suddenly realized that they had totally screwed everything up, and someone had to be the fall guy. So you sign a few papers and declare that your clueless friend "Brownie" is in charge just in time so he can get the boot. Sweet.

- rob 3:39 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Maher: Nothing funny about Hurricane Katrina

CARLSON: Almost aesthetic level, aren’t you repulsed by Clinton’s never ending self-righteousness? The other day, over the weekend, he says essentially, I would have done a better job responding to Katrina because I am a better person, great guy, look at me, great administration. Doesn’t the constant bragging make you want to throw up?

MAHER: You know what makes me want to throw up, seeing dead bodies floating in New Orleans, that makes me want to throw up.

That kind of stuff that would not have happened under Bill Clinton. You can’t tell me that you think that FEMA would have not been a completely different agency and that Clinton would have been all over this situation from minute one like white on rice.

You don’t think that’s who Bill Clinton is? He would not have slept from the moment this hurricane started to hit until we could do the best we could with the situation.

You’re angry at his self-righteousness at a time when there are hundreds and hundreds of dead bodies that are on the tab of George Bush? Why don’t you focus your anger on the guy who really deserves it?

- rob 1:25 PM - [PermaLink] -

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"It is the first responsibility of every citizen to question anuthority."
- Benjamin Franklin

That quote leads me to an excellent poster that both supports our troops and supports the fact that citizens are responsible for making sure they fight only in wars that are necessary.



That and many other posters like it (and much more) can be found at the excellent: Project for the OLD American Century

Saw this at Corrente's new site: Corrent Wire.

- rob 1:17 PM - [PermaLink] -

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FBI Agent says it for me

FBI forms anti-porn squad
'I guess this means we've won the war on terror,' one agent says

- rob 5:45 PM - [PermaLink] -

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It wasn't insider trading -- he just looked at a videotape of the financials and based on his years in the medical profession realized the company needed to have some stock sold -- his.

Senator Sold Stock Before Price Dropped

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a potential presidential candidate in 2008, sold all his stock in his family's hospital corporation about two weeks before it issued a disappointing earnings report and the price fell nearly 15 percent.

Frist held an undisclosed amount of stock in Hospital Corporation of America, based in Nashville, the nation's largest for-profit hospital chain. On June 13, he instructed the trustee managing the assets to sell his HCA shares and those of his wife and children, said Amy Call, a spokeswoman for Frist.

Frist's shares were sold by July 1 and those of his wife and children by July 8, Call said.
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HCA shares peaked at midyear, climbing to $58.22 a share on June 22. After slipping slightly for two weeks, the price fell to $49.90 on July 13 after the company announced its quarterly earnings would not meet analysts' expectations.

- rob 5:29 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Hey its me John Bolton, yep that's got to be my favorite picture from my Fall, 2000 Florida vacation (paid for by FOG [Friends of George]).

Arianna Huffington: Plamegate: The John Bolton Connection

And you thought Bolton was just about destroying the UN.

- rob 5:24 PM - [PermaLink] -

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They reall did want a "new Pearl Harbor"

Daily Kos: Specter Wondering Why His Able Danger Hearing Scuttled by Rummy

- rob 5:21 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Republican Power Brokers Terrorists (it seems)

The Stakeholder:: Sensing a Pattern?

1) We've got Norquist and Abdurahman Alamoudi

Starting in 1998, Norquist put his considerable political skills in the service of such Islamists as Abdurahman Alamoudi and Sami al-Arian. The former was then the driving force behind the American Muslim Council, or AMC. At the time, Alamoudi's Council was arguably the pre-eminent Islamist front group in America.
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Today, both Alamoudi and al-Arian are in jail on terrorism-related charges. Alamoudi is serving a 23-year sentence, having pled guilty to conspiring with Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi to kill the then-crown prince of Saudi Arabia. Last month, the U.S. Treasury Department announced, "The September 2003 arrest of Alamoudi was a severe blow to al-Qaida, as Alamoudi had a close relationship with al-Qaida and had raised money for al-Qaida in the United States."

2)We've got Abramoff and Saleh Abdullah Kamel

Shortly after 9/11, Abramoff signed up as a lobbyist for this consortium of banks that operate according to sharia, or Islamic law. According to the National Journal (Aug 31, 2002), the consortium was created after the attacks as President Bush began cracking down on terrorist financing. Abramoff's job was to spread the word about Islamic banking practices and to refute claims that Islamic banks sheltered money used for terrorist networks. And if anyone needed a good PR man, it was the chairman of the General Council for Islamic Banks, a Saudi businessman named Saleh Abdullah Kamel estimated to be worth in the neighborhood of $ 2.6 billion, who was quickly the subject of intense government scrutiny over his possible ties to terrorist activity.

You see, Kamel is also the chairman of Dallah al Baraka Group (DBG), which is suspected of having ties to al Qaeda and other extremist groups, and he was also the co-founder and large shareholder of Al Shamal Bank in Sudan, Osama bin Laden's bank of choice from 1983 onward.
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Kamel's name also appeared in the "Golden Chain," a roster seized by Bosnian authorities in Sarajevo in March 2002 listing Saudi donors to bin Laden and his associates....

3) Recently arrested Safavian and some people he didn't tell anyone he did some lobbying work for

David H. Safavian, the Bush administration official arrested Monday, initially failed to disclose lobbying work he had done for several controversial foreign clients when he went before a Senate panel last year to be confirmed as chief of the White House's federal procurement office.
The Senate Governmental Affairs Committee held up Safavian's nomination for more than a year, in part because of lawmakers' concerns about lobbying work for two men later accused of links to suspected terrorist organizations, according to committee documents. Safavian did not disclose his firm's representation of the men until questioned in writing by the committee's staff, and initially failed to tell the panel he had registered as a foreign agent for two controversial African regimes.

These people love money and power... America is simply where they live and they use Patriotism as a marketing gimick while they'll aide anyone who gives them a buck.

- rob 5:20 PM - [PermaLink] -

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1.8 Billion Bullets Shot in Iraq?
As reported in Will Neocon Fanaticism Destroy America?.

"According to the Sept. 1 Manufacturing & Technology News, the Government Accounting Office has reported that over the course of the cakewalk war, the U.S. military's use of small caliber ammunition has risen to 1.8 billion rounds. Think about that number. If there are 20,000 insurgents, it means U.S. troops have fired 90,000 rounds at each insurgent.

Very few have been hit. We don't know how many. To avoid the analogy with Vietnam, until last week the U.S. military studiously avoided body counts. If 2,000 insurgents have been killed, each death required 900,000 rounds of ammunition."

- Edoc 12:49 PM - [PermaLink] -

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FEMA - It's what Brownie would have wanted

FEMA Sends Trucks Full Of Ice For Katrina Victims To Maine

The trucks started arriving this weekend, and they're expected to keep coming through Sunday.

City officials say they have no idea why the trucks are here, only that the city has been asked to help out with traffic problems. But the truck drivers NEWSCENTER spoke to said they went all the way down to the gulf coast with the ice -- stayed for a few days -- and then were told by FEMA they needed to drive to Maine to store it.

The truck drivers, who are from all over the country, tell us they were subcontracted by FEMA.
They started arriving over the weekend, and city spokesperson Peter Dewitt says as many as 200 trucks could come to the city by the end of the week.

- rob 6:57 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Weird in Iraq when their government officials use defense contracts to pay off friends they get in trouble

Ex-Iraqi defence minister wanted over $1bn fraud

Iraqi authorities are preparing an arrest warrant for the country's former defence minister in connection with a massive fraud case involving the "disappearance" of more than $1bn from ministry coffers.
Judge Raid al-Radhi, who is head of Iraq's commission on public integrity, said yesterday that he had given Iraq's central criminal court a dossier of evidence against Hazim Shaalan, who was minister of defence under the former government of Ayed Allawi.

"What Shaalan and his ministry were responsible for is possibly the largest robbery in the world. Our estimates begin at $1.3bn [£720m] and go up to $2.3bn," Judge Radhi, who is Iraq's senior anti-corruption official, told Reuters.

The "robbery" is believed to include the signing of multimillion-dollar deals with companies to supply equipment that was sometimes inappropriate for the new army or was years out of date. It is also alleged that the ministry paid huge premiums for some military hardware.

- rob 6:20 PM - [PermaLink] -

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It starts like this: Former GSA official arrested

WASHINGTON, Sept. 19 /U.S. Newswire/ -- A former General Services Administration (GSA) official was arrested on charges of making false statements and obstructing an investigation by the GSA's Office of Inspector General (GSA-OIG), Assistant Attorney General Alice S. Fisher of the Criminal Division announced today.

David Hossein Safavian was arrested today based on a three- count criminal complaint filed at federal court in Washington, D.C. The complaint charges Safavian with making false statements to a GSA ethics officer and the GSA-OIG, along with obstruction of a GSA-OIG investigation.

The affidavit filed in support of the criminal complaint alleges that from May 16, 2002 until January 10, 2004, Safavian served as Chief of Staff at the GSA. During that time he allegedly aided a Washington D.C. lobbyist in the lobbyist's attempts to acquire GSA-controlled property in and around Washington, D.C. In August 2002, this lobbyist allegedly took Safavian and others on a golf trip to Scotland.

Grows to this: Email from arrested White House official suggests powerful congressman lied about trip

Safavian, 38, who oversaw $300 billion in federal procurement for President George W. Bush, quit Friday after an FBI operation alleged he obstructed an investigation and tried to finagle a government deal for a friend. He was appointed in 2004.

Yet what is most significant about Safavian's case isn't Safavian himself. It’s the fact that he was arrested—and that emails he sent to conservative superlobbyist Jack Abramoff indicated that those on the trip knew that a trip to Scotland in 2002 was being paid for by the lobbyist.

An email sent by Safavian appears to indicate that the powerful Rep. Bob Ney (R-OH) lied when he said he was "duped" by Abramoff and lied again on financial disclosure forms when he said that a nonprofit had paid for the trip, RAW STORY has found.

And even sprouts new shoots?

Abramoff's White House Connections

In addition to Safavian, Abramoff is known to have close ties to at least one other key White House official: Susan B. Ralston, Karl Rove's omnipresent assistant and gatekeeper.

Here's Peter H. Stone writing in the National Journal last year: "As presidential adviser Karl Rove set up shop in the West Wing in 2001, he was looking for an assistant to serve as the trusted gatekeeper of his new fiefdom. Superlobbyist and Republican fundraiser Jack Abramoff was happy to lend a hand. Abramoff knew just the right person for the job: his own assistant, Susan Ralston. She interviewed with Rove and got the position."
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Ralston was in the news most recently for being summoned to testify in July before the grand jury investigating the leak of the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame. Rove, of course, is one of the central figures in that investigation.

Will this little weed be the one that finally clues people into to the state of our Garden.

The Rose Garden is all weeds. The Executive Branch and many of the legislative branch have been looting our treasury, weakening our nation, and willfully lying to the people. There are only pests and weeds left. The level of corruption and graft will soon become apparent and it will all collapse and Bush's legacy will be the tea pot dome of the 21st century.

- rob 3:46 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Iraq is a free independent country?

Then what does it mean when our allies bust out prisoners?

Official: British troops freed injailbreak

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- A British armored vehicle escorted by a tank crashed into a detention center Monday in Basra and rescued two undercover troops held by police, an Iraqi Interior Ministry official told CNN.

British Defense Ministry Secretary John Reid confirmed two British military personnel were "released," but he gave no details on how they were freed.
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The official said two unknown gunmen in full Arabic dress began firing on civilians in central Basra, wounding several, including a traffic police officer. There were no fatalities, the official said.

The two gunmen fled the scene but were captured and taken in for questioning, admitting they were British marines carrying out a "special security task," the official said.

British troops launched the rescue about three hours after Iraqi authorities informed British commanders the men were being held at the police department's major crime unit, the official said.

- rob 12:08 PM - [PermaLink] -

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We've been talking about electronic voting and Diebold for 2.5 years now (pretty much from the beginning), so of course we'd want to link to this;

THE BRAD BLOG: "* EXCLUSIVE! * A DIEBOLD INSIDER SPEAKS!"

Pointing to a little-noticed "Cyber Security Alert" issued by the United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT), a division of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, the source inside Diebold -- who "for the time being" is requesting anonymity due to a continuing sensitive relationship with the company -- is charging that Diebold's technicians, including at least one of its lead programmers, knew about the security flaw and that the company instructed them to keep quiet about it.

"Diebold threatened violators with immediate dismissal," the insider, who we'll call DIEB-THROAT, explained recently to The BRAD BLOG via email. "In 2005, after one newly hired member of Diebold's technical staff pointed out the security flaw, he was criticized and isolated."

In phone interviews, DIEB-THROAT confirmed that the matters were well known within the company, but that a "culture of fear" had been developed to assure that employees, including technicians, vendors and programmers kept those issues to themselves.

The "Cyber Security Alert" from US-CERT was issued in late August of 2004 and is still available online via the US-CERT website. The alert warns that "A vulnerability exists due to an undocumented backdoor account, which could [sic: allow] a local or remote authenticated malicious user [sic: to] modify votes."
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DIEB-THROAT claims that, though the Federal Government knew about this documented flaw, originally discovered and reported by BlackBoxVoting.org in August of 2004, they did nothing about it.

"I believe that top Government officials had an understanding with top Diebold officials to look the other way," the source explained, "because Diebold was their ace in the hole."...

But even DIEB-THROAT -- who says "we were brainwashed" by the company to believe such concerns about security were nonsense -- was surprised to learn that an arm of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security was well aware of this flaw, and concerned enough about it to issue a public alert prior to the election last year.

"I was aware of the Diebold security flaw and had heard about the Homeland Security Cyber Alert Threat Assessment website, so I went there and 'bingo,' there it was in black and white," the source wrote. "It blew me away because it showed that DHS, headed by a Cabinet level George Bush loyalist, was very aware of the 'threat' of someone changing votes in the Diebold Central Tabulator. The question is, why wasn't something done about it before the election?"

- rob 11:32 AM - [PermaLink] -

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Look to Baghdad if you want to see some real looting

What has happened to Iraq's missing $1bn?

One billion dollars has been plundered from Iraq's defence ministry in one of the largest thefts in history, The Independent can reveal, leaving the country's army to fight a savage insurgency with museum-piece weapons.

The money, intended to train and equip an Iraqi army capable of bringing security to a country shattered by the US-led invasion and prolonged rebellion, was instead siphoned abroad in cash and has disappeared.

"It is possibly one of the largest thefts in history," Ali Allawi, Iraq's Finance Minister, told The Independent.
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Government officials in Baghdad even suggest that the skill with which the robbery was organised suggests that the Iraqis involved were only front men, and "rogue elements" within the US military or intelligence services may have played a decisive role behind the scenes.

Given that building up an Iraqi army to replace American and British troops is a priority for Washington and London, the failure to notice that so much money was being siphoned off at the very least argues a high degree of negligence on the part of US officials and officers in Baghdad.
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The money missing from all ministries under the interim Iraqi government appointed by the US in June 2004 may turn out to be close to $2bn. Of a military procurement budget of $1.3bn, some $200m may have been spent on usable equipment, though this is a charitable view, say officials.

- rob 11:09 AM - [PermaLink] -

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I'm sure if someone were to look into it - not me I'm lazy - we'll find that the Manufactured Housing Institute and its members were hella big campaign donors to the Bush administration

Cause they got a nice $5 billion

Critics Fear Trailer 'Ghettos'

On the sprawling, dusty grounds of Lone Star Army Ammunition Plant and Red River Army Depot in Texarkana, Tex., the recreational vehicles and mobile homes are arriving at a rate of 100 a day before being shipped out to the fringes of Hurricane Katrina's disaster zone.

Those trailers, among 300,000 to be purchased with nearly $5 billion of federal money, have become a focal point of criticism of the Bush administration's early rebuilding efforts. Some conservatives blanch at the cost.
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But most of all, housing experts -- conservatives and liberals alike -- worry that Federal Emergency Management Agency encampments will quickly become what former House Speaker Newt Gingrich called "ghettos of despair." Rental vouchers in a market with plenty of available housing would be cheaper and faster and provide better accommodations, they say.

Fiasco.

Now FEMA is looking at a map and finding all the tornado prone areas at which to place these new insta-slums.

(okay I looked it up - in 2000 Manufactured Housing Institute donated $50k to political campaigns - 40k of which were to Republicans -- in 1998 they donated primarily to Dems).

- rob 11:02 AM - [PermaLink] -

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For those of you who defend FEMA and Bush by saying "Why didn't those people in the Convention Center just walk out of there?"

Well many tried
and they were denied.

After Blocking the Bridge, Gretna Circles the Wagons

GRETNA, La. — Little over a week after this mostly white suburb became a symbol of callousness for using armed officers to seal one of the last escape routes from New Orleans — trapping thousands of mostly black evacuees in the flooded city — the Gretna City Council passed a resolution supporting the police chief's move.

"This wasn't just one man's decision," Mayor Ronnie C. Harris said Thursday. "The whole community backs it."

Three days after Hurricane Katrina hit, Gretna officers blocked the Mississippi River bridge that connects their city to New Orleans, exacerbating the sometimes troubled relationship with their neighbor. The blockade remained in place into the Labor Day weekend.
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The San Francisco paramedics said in an interview and in their article that there were gunshots over the heads of people crossing the bridge from New Orleans' convention center — many of them elderly — where they were stuck for days without food, water and working toilets.

Nagin, New Orleans' mayor, said that he'd heard similar reports about gunfire, as well as people being turned back by guard dogs.

- rob 10:49 AM - [PermaLink] -

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Nature attacked us on 8/29
We must take this fight to nature
If you support nature you are an enemy of the United States

Yep, Rove is in charge

E-mail suggests government seeking to blame groups

Federal officials appear to be seeking proof to blame the flood of New Orleans on environmental groups, documents show.

The Clarion-Ledger has obtained a copy of an internal e-mail the U.S. Department of Justice sent out this week to various U.S. attorneys' offices: "Has your district defended any cases on behalf of the (U.S.) Army Corps of Engineers against claims brought by environmental groups seeking to block or otherwise impede the Corps work on the levees protecting New Orleans? If so, please describe the case and the outcome of the litigation."
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The corps settled the litigation in 1997, agreeing to hold off on some work until an environmental impact could be completed. The National Review article concluded: "Whether this delay directly affected the levees that broke in New Orleans is difficult to ascertain."

The problem with that conclusion?

The levees that broke causing New Orleans to flood weren't Mississippi River levees. They were levees that protected the city from Lake Pontchartrain levees on the other side of the city.

- rob 10:14 AM - [PermaLink] -

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How are tax dollars are used

Daily Kos: Indentured Servitude

KBR employs "TCNs"--Third Country Nationals--to do much of the menial work. The DFACs have Western supervisors, but all the workers are from a third world country. At my FOB, the workers are from Sri Lanka. You couldn't ask for a nicer bunch of guys (all male). They work twelve hours a day, seven days a week, to put out four meals a day for everyone on the FOB. And they get paid $300/month. However, KBR charges the government $3000/month per worker. I suppose the other $2700 is for room & board (which is about what I pay in rent and food for my family in Massachusetts). They don't even get hot water for showers. KBR can do this, I found out, because the workers are actually employed through an agency in another country. (I was given the details of by some of the workers themselves, and by a couple of suprevisors.) The Sri Lankans here have it better than the Pakistanis and Indians with whom we worked at the port in Kuwait: they made $250 a month (12 hours/day, 7 days/week) on a three year contract (they were allowed a month's vacation after two years), and they lived in broken down old prefab building, taking showers outside. Every one of the soldiers in my company has been appalled. I've just been angry.

- rob 10:00 AM - [PermaLink] -

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So at 6:44PM on Friday the 16th I get an email:

New Flash for Rob and TCS

An interesting thing happened yesterday.... a friend of mine at Lennox
Hill hospital told me that all ambulance traffic going to NY
Presbyterian Hospital was rerouted for a time to Lennox Hill due to
Dick Cheney being at Presbyterian Hospital for some unknown procedure.

Makes one think. Is his ticker having problems again or something else?

Then just after midnight Saturday morning this appeared:

HoustonChronicle.com - Cheney will have surgery for aneurysm behind knee

WASHINGTON - Vice President Dick Cheney will undergo surgery next week to repair a weakness in a blood vessel behind his right knee, his spokesman confirmed Friday.

Weaknesses in the vessels in both knees were discovered during a checkup this summer.

But what does this have to do with the NY Presbyterian Hospital? And why were there reports of large black "lizard" like animals flying through the air in NY this past week?

- rob 9:54 AM - [PermaLink] -

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My Uncle Is My Hero

So I'm not fighting in his war -- I'm being an abusive drunk, just like he would want me to.

Bush Nephew Arrested - September 16, 2005

SEPTEMBER 16--One of President George W. Bush's nephews--the youngest son of Florida Governor Jeb Bush--was arrested early today and charged with public drunkenness and resisting arrest.

- rob 9:17 AM - [PermaLink] -

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Sites we often like:

Tin Foil Caps

The Free Speech Zone

The office of the independent blogger

Buzzflash

Tom The Dancing Bug

VerifiedVoting.org

Get Your War On

This Modern World

Eschaton / Atrios

Daily Kos

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Some More Site Mottos

"To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American people."
- Teddy Roosevelt



"Government has a final responsibility for the well-being of its citizenship. If private cooperative endeavor fails to provide work for willing hands and relief for the unfortunate, those suffering hardship from no fault of their own have a right to call upon the Government for aid; and a government worthy of its name must make fitting response."
 - Franklin Delano Roosevelt



"I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and Constitutions, but laws must and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors."
- Thomas Jefferson



"The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home."

"All men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree."
- James Madison



"I believe in human dignity as the source of national purpose, in human liberty as the source of national action, in the human heart as the source of national compassion, and in the human mind as the source of our invention and our ideas. It is, I believe, the faith in our fellow citizens as individuals and as people that lies at the heart of the liberal faith. For liberalism is not so much a party creed or set of fixed platform promises as it is an attitude of mind and heart, a faith in man's ability through the experiences of his reason and judgment to increase for himself and his fellow men the amount of justice and freedom and brotherhood which all human life deserves."
- John F. Kennedy



"Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Among them are [a] few other Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or business man from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid."
- Dwight D. Eisenhower

More Sites we often like:

more coming...

"There's nothing wrong with America that can't be fixed by what's right with America." - Bill Clinton.